Where the Wagon Led

W.J.C. Cherwinski is a professor of history at Memorial University of
Newfoundland and the co-author of Lectures in Canadian Labour and
Working-Class History.

Like singer-songwriter Ian Tyson, whose Cowboyography was released in
1986, R.D. Symons was an outsider who adopted the life of the cowboy
wholeheartedly. Though born in England, he became one of the cowboy
subculture’s most dedicated practitioners and promoters. In this book,
he traces the changing landscape of the Western Canadian frontier as it
receded before the plow, starting with the bitter winter of 1906–07,
which marked the beginning of the end of the Canadian prairies’
ranching industry. Symons’s tribute to a way of life that has all but
disappeared is heartfelt. His book is salted with his own evocative
drawings of memorable places, people, and horses.